You know it’s a bad poker night when you’re bluffing with an IOU scribbled on a cocktail napkin and the other guy’s holding aces.

That’s precisely where Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky finds himself—trapped in a geopolitical dumpster fire, relying on U.S. goodwill that’s as stable as a meth-fueled Diddy orgy.

My first visit was in 2016 during the winter with my American girlfriend, who had immigrated from Ukraine as a teen. This was long before it became Vogue to visit as an American. Then, a few years later, I made friends with the founder of the Fedoriv agency, Andriy, during the Cannes Lions conference in France. I started doing business in Kyiv with Fedoriv in 2018 because their agency delivered world-class advertising videos for my old business, The Crate Club at a fraction of the price I would have had to pay in New York.

I was sitting on the rooftop of the Bursa hotel in Kyiv, the summer before Putin invaded, when I brought up a potential conflict with Andriy, who at the time thought I was crazy. Until he called in January to ask if he should get his family out. I said, yes, and thankfully, he did.

I love Ukraine, so this is hard for me to write, but the hard truth is that without Donald Trump’s blessing, Zelensky’s war effort, Ukraine’s effort, is nothing but a futile scream into the void.

Let’s be crystal clear—Zelensky didn’t cook up this disaster. Back in 2014, when Ukrainians booted their Putin-loving puppet Viktor Yanukovych out of office during the brutal Maidan Revolution, it was Uncle Sam—via the CIA and covert diplomatic tango—cheering loudest from behind the curtains. The Stars and Stripes had their fingerprints all over the uprising, whispering promises of freedom and democracy into Ukraine’s eager ears while quietly flipping off the Kremlin.

When it comes to Ukraine, American mainstream media outlets are serving up a half-cooked narrative seasoned generously with ignorance and garnished with a sprinkle of virtue-signaling. According to recent pearl-clutching headlines, Trump’s suggestion that negotiations with Putin might actually be a rational step forward equates to rewarding “Russian aggression.” They scream, they panic, and they play geopolitical Twister while entirely missing the game.

Here’s the deal: Ukraine and Russia have a twisted, complicated relationship that American journalists tend to ignore in their rush for easy villains and clear-cut heroes. Long before vodka shots became trendy in Brooklyn bars and Instagrammers started hashtagging Kyiv, Ukraine was Russian—period. We’re talking about centuries of intertwined history, messy cultural overlap, and political entanglements tighter than your Uncle Larry’s waistband after Thanksgiving dinner.